“Big Swede”, a man who causes me no shortage of pain as he shoots his sling shot from across the room – remote and vaguely related reference here, a YouTube there, here a link, there a link, everywhere a link link – put up the following post at Electric City Weblog in a thread about OBama’s receipt of the Nobel Peace Prize:
Chinese Human Rights Activist Hu Jia – imprisoned for campaigning for human rights in the PRC, not as worthy as Barack Hussein Obama.
Wei Jingsheng, who spent 17 years in Chinese prisons for urging reforms of China’s communist system. — not as worthy as Barack Hussein Obama. (Not to mention the symbolic value of awarding a Chinese dissident on the 20th Anniversary of the Tianenmen Square Massacre.)
Greg Mortenson, founder of the Central Asia Institute has built nearly 80 schools, especially for girls, in remote areas of northern Pakistan and Afghanistan over the past 15 years – not as worthy as Barack Hussein Obama.
Prince Ghazi bin Muhammad, a philosophy professor in Jordan who risks his life by advocating interfaith dialogue between Jews and Muslims, also not as worthy as Barack Hussein Obama.
Afghan human rights activist Sima Samar. She currently leads the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission and serves as the U.N. special envoy to Darfur and is apparently also not as worthy as Barack Hussein Obama.
Now I’m no fool, or at least not that big a fool. Swede would not be putting up salivating praise for these people had it not been an opportunity for him to savage Obama. But I like it nonetheless. It brings us closer together – Hu Jia, Wei Jingsheng, Greg Mortenson, Prince Ghazi bin Muhammad, and Sima Samar are indeed more worthy of recognition than the man brought to power in the U.S. by a pretty face and a slick ad campaign and who is carrying on its war-making activities.
Greg Mortenson is from Bozeman, MT, and is co-author of the book Three Cups of Tea, which recounts a K-2 mountain climbing expedition that led to near-tragedy. Separated from his group of climbers and exhausted, he was nursed back to by the villagers of Korphe, in Pakistan. Mortenson was charmed by their hospitality, and pledged to raise funds to build them a school.
As so often happens, this side trip became his life’s highway. So far he and his organization, the Central Asia Institute, have built 131 schools that focus on educating young girls.
We attended an event of his in Bozeman while we lived there, and a much larger event at Red Rocks Auditorium in nearby Morrison, Colorado last month. It’s an odd sort of event, as it is surely put together to raise money. But Mortenson is shy and retiring, and so allows his thirteen year old daughter, Amira, to do most of the talking. She’s a natural showman.
He does not ask for money – this ain’t no Billy Graham revival. He merely celebrates life and people. He Skyped in people now in school who got their start in his brick and mortar classrooms. It’s wonderful to see young people brought to life, their little lights afire with knowledge and ambition. Education will do that to a person.
If you want to send him a check … well, send him a check. He’ll use it wisely.
Mortenson is a truly humble and caring man. His work is ongoing. He’s done so much more to foster peace in this world than Barack Obama that the Nobel Peace Prize Committee ought to be disbanded and replaced with a group of humanitarians, people less drawn to political glitter and more to true people of peace, as listed by Swede above.
PS: Since it is Swede I am dealing with here, I cannot help but note that his “communist” China is now also “capitalist” China, and that the two walk hand-in-hand on the beach like young lovers. If you cannot explain the contradiction, perhaps you can internalize it? Cognitive dissonance does a body good.
Piece of Mindful 
One of my first jobs in Billings was asst. mgr. of a sporting goods store. This chain had its purchasing manager in our store. One day a group of well dressed business people and the regional mgr. came to me to ask which set of duck decoys sell the best. I brought them a sample, which they stuck into their sales case. Later I asked what that was all about. The manager told me that they were going to China with several items for the Chinese to copy and to sell back to us.
This was in the late 70’s. I firmly believe that it was the capitalists going to China which sowed the seeds of china’s revolution. Revolution which inspired Jingsheng and Jia, worthy recipients.
Good post Mark, take out the “fake homage” part and it achieves greatness.
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The situation is much too complicated for my grasp. I do not sense that there is political freedom in China, nor any great strides in bringing it about.
But then, I don’t sense much political freedom in this country. Just an illusion – “plutonomy”, as Citibank called it in Moore’s movie.
There is a burgeoning economy, but wages are still very low overall. What is emerging are capitalists – people who are profiting immendsely while paying low wages.
And what you witnessed, with the duck decoys, is what I would call “arbitrage” – those guys were not exporting freedom, not even incidentally. They had in mind using cheap labor, laying off American workers, and pocketing the difference.
A win, a big loss, and a loss. Guess who won.
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Your humble servant obliges …
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